


The Cupid Hotel: Shepard and T'Soni

by softly_speaking_valkyrie



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Anniversary, Couple, Cute, Dates, Domestic, Embracing Eternity, F/F, Femslash, Lesbians, Mass Effect 3, Smut, The Cupid Hotel, WLW Couple, lesbian couple, queer, shiara
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-05-20
Packaged: 2019-05-09 12:29:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14716058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softly_speaking_valkyrie/pseuds/softly_speaking_valkyrie
Summary: Part 3 of The Cupid Hotel Chronicles. Shepard and Liara take a break from the rest of the family as part of their mandatory shore leave to spend their anniversary together, just the two of them. After a morning and afternoon of blowing off steam in a combat simulator in a whacky and weird hotel, they run out of ideas, and get approached by a pink-haired woman offering the night of a lifetime for them both…





	The Cupid Hotel: Shepard and T'Soni

“Remind me again, T’Soni, why, when we’re only here for four days and then back out into the war zone of a galaxy, are we spending one of those days slogging through a combat simulator no better than the Armax Arena?” Shepard asked, panting briskly in between a duo of false Geth coming at her with shotguns.

She applied an overload spike to one of them and grappled with the second. With a hefty heave, she tossed it over her shoulder in a flamboyant suplex and drove her vicious omni-blade through its head the second she could. Standing up she followed up by drawing her second holographic blade and slashing across the second’s chest, cutting it in half.

“And you could also tell me,” she grunted, leapt across the field to the dish stranded on the floor. Kicking at it, she held the shield once more. “Why am I using this shield?” She asked her Asari lover as Liara snapped her wrists again, channelling what dark energy she could into one streamlined concentration, bending gravity to her will. She formed a singularity across the plain and the Geth swarmed all over it, helpless to do anything else.

Shepard leapt back across a railing and stood side by side with her established lover, as they turned to face the mass of Geth with drawn firearms and other equipment gifted to them.

“Because, my love,” Liara started, focusing her biotic abilities once again and launching a scatter burst of throw orbs at the Geth, with some warp attacks mixed in. “I thought you would like this to blow off some steam,” she told Shepard as they both emptied thermal clips into the Geth, ripping them apart with their tech and biotic talents. “And you told me you were a fan of that old Earth superhero comic. The one who had the shield - Captain America?” Liara asked, unsure about the name of the man after all. She just remembered critically that he held a circular shield and that he was very old now.

More Geth swarmed out of the entry tunnels and caught both women off guard suddenly. Shepard held up the novelty shield to deflect some of the plasma shots, infamously synonymous with Geth weapons even in a knock-off simulation such as this. Landing after a twirl, Shepard threw the dish at a trio of them knocking all to the floor and she cleaned up with three swift headshots as Liara snapped up a biotic field to disintegrate shots coming her way. The Asari Matron ended them with more of her own shots and warp fields. Her amp was humming at the tip of her spine and the rush from the dark energy flowing through her made Liara feel vibrant and powerful. The purple glow she exhumed even felt as attractive to her as it looked to Shepard.

“Hon, when I said I was a fan of Captain America, I didn’t mean to incline that I wanted to fight with his shield on our shore leave,” Shepard gasped to her lover, shooting more Geth simulations and blocking all of their own shots with the flimsy shield. It felt as clunky as she thought it looked.

Shepard felt like her sudden business had been to debunk the legends that were superheroes. She was more than any Captain America could ever be with just her N7 armour, physical conditioning courtesy of the program and her overtaxed omni-tool as it snapped overload shunts all the livelong day.

Liara was toying with a pool of more Geth, stripping the Pyros away with her warp fields and messing with the drones by creating another singularity between clusters of them. “Well, forgive me, I thought the idea would have been right up your street, given your field for the dramatics recently.”

A laugh spiked from the redhead Shepard as she flung the shield at a trooper and kicked herself into an infiltrator, slicing him up with two strikes of her omni-blades, all before retrieving the shield once more. “You’re never gonna let me live the fish tank fiasco down, are you, honey?” Shepard asked, shooting into two more Geth.

Out of ammo in the Carnifex Hand Cannon, Shepard switched weapons, her Vindicator Battle Rifle on her right shoulder blade reacting as if it had a mind of her own when she flexed to reach for its stock. The way guns behaved sometimes amazed her, integrated with a suit VI.

“You are lucky I didn’t let Tali come with us,” Liara replied, launching herself in a biotic charge across the field to join her lover, leaping off of her shield and blasting a slew of Geth with her submachine gun now.

Shepard rubbed the back of her neck as she breathed and felt shots hitting the back of her personal shield. Turning rapidly she set up the disk in front of her as cover and fired the Vindicator over it in a hailfire of rounds to dispatch them. Shepard was sweating with exhilaration - needless to say, regardless of the dish made of metal in her left hand, she was enjoying this more than a normal firefight. At least here there were no stakes and it was all about having fun with the person who meant most to her above all the others. Liara was busy distracting her with a more purple glowing radiance of the biotic field she emanated. As Shepard tried to reload with one hand, Liara snapped her hand back in her direction and fired off another singularity field over to the Geth and followed it up with a warp field from the sole of her foot, detonating the area with a pulse of toxic and purple dark energy. Shepard's heart was thumping inside her chassis as she looked to the gorgeously powerful Asari, clenching her fist, unintentionally flexing her ripped bicep as she too reloaded.

“Did I mention how gorgeous you’re looking this evening, T’Soni?” Shepard flirted shamelessly, taking the break in the Geth to cross the distance, slotting the Vindicator back on her shoulder blade and holding Liara’s waist with her free hand now. “Absolutely gorgeous.”

Liara was smirking at her, equally without shame. “You seem to bring it out of me in conditions like these, Shepard,” the Asari sighed, leaning in and kissing her companion lovingly, cupping her fair cheek and running stray blue fingers through starburst red hair. “Besides, I guess you would know a thing or two about looking flawless on the battlefield, Commander.”

Shepard had to chuckle, grinning a toothy smile as she blushed into her girlfriend’s eyes. “I guess I do look good in a uniform,” she teased, playing along and looking down at the marked ‘N7’ placard on her black suit. It had been the same armour (more or less, probably less) that she’d worn taking down Saren Arterius on the Citadel years ago, even the same armour she had worn when rescuing the younger Doctor T’Soni on Therum in Artemis Tau. That felt like a lifetime ago, and in Shepard’s case, it clinically was. And thinking about that, in particular, made Shepard feel weirder than usual - the whole concept about Project Lazarus hadn’t been something she had brought to the table of conversation with Liara since they had taken down the Shadow Broker, and even that felt like forever ago.

Three or four years (Shepard was losing count and so was Liara) had blended into what felt like an eternity to them both. Shepard had started a new life and still Liara would outlive her. Time and age began to dissolve in their minds, leaving them constantly with the here and now.

Yet here and now, felt very good indeed.

Looking into each other’s eyes around the combat simulator, starstruck with each other, they kissed again, Shepard dropping the novelty superhero shield and holding Liara firmly, strongly in her arms. The Asari felt perfect, like a puzzle piece to Shepard’s grasp, and she never wanted to let go, like every time she held the perfect woman. Liara was perfect in her emerald eyes, in her mind’s eye. She loved the woman with every organic and synthetic fibre of her being. And it was the purest love the super soldier had ever felt for anyone else.

“Happy anniversary, Shepard.”

They smiled at each other and continued to kiss, standing as the round signalled the end of the games and the culmination of their time in the simulator. At least it was more time than the Armax Arsenal Arena Simulator offered.

“Plans? Please tell me you have a plan for what we do next, hon. We have about three and half days until we need to be back in drydock, and I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not spend all of it doing what we normally do,” Shepard griped, chugging on her soda for the last of what it was worth. They decided to have a cheat meal after the combat simulator and hopped across the hotel to a fast food chain. Liara was utterly stupefied with what she had ordered - a cheeseburger with bacon, it astounded her.

Liara looked around the thing, seeing the cheese trying to escape to the left, and the heat radiating from the bun made her feel even more dissonant from the thing. Why had she even ordered it?

“Is there something wrong, Liara?” Shepard asked, non-purposefully flexing her exposed arms as she finished a french fry. It had been ages since she’d even eaten at a human fast food restaurant, but this hotel had absolutely everything - they had been reminded of that at the check-in desk by the pink-haired woman claiming to be a Roman God. Shepard was still on the fence about that, and Liara didn’t believe her at all. The whole idea that The Cupid Hotel was multidimensional was also an outrageous claim. Both women were settling on the idea that it was simply so huge, it could accommodate any facility. The Citadel seemed big enough to facilitate that much space anyway, all it would take was someone with enough wealth and political pull to occupy the construction.

If Jien Garson could finance an expedition to a whole other galaxy for life, one that would take six-hundred years to even reach, then anyone could finance anything in this galaxy.

“Shepard, I am not entirely sure that this is, in fact, Earth-grown bovine meat in this cheeseburger,” Liara noticed, looking at the patty eerily and feeling freaked out by it.

The redheaded Commander giggled a little. “I don’t suspect it is at all, hon. These places never serve real meat, never have either,” she confessed, splitting Liara’s burger in half and taking part for herself since it was obvious that the Asari wasn’t going to partake. “Here, try some of the fries, I promise they’re actual potato and not paste,” she offered, handing Liara some of the salty sticks with an inviting smile.

The Shadow Broker took a french fry and nibbled on it cautiously, seeming delighted at the taste a little later. “It’s good!” She beamed, swiping another from Shepard’s pile and munching happily.

Shepard chuckled again, heartily before sipping more soda. “So come on, what should we do for the rest of the day? Our anniversary is all day and so far we’ve only done what we usually do - kill things. Not that I didn’t love it, Liara.”

Still tasting the french fries, Liara stopped and watered it down with a bottle of mineral water. They theoretically had the whole of creation (if the so-called Cupid) was to be believed. But they were both drawing blanks.

“Might I recommend the Ice Ring on the fifteenth floor? Or maybe something a little more personal, like a riverboat ride on an uncharted world?” A voice said nearby. Both women turned to look and saw a familiar pink-haired woman, dainty and short with her hair braided into two tails folding over her broad and exposed shoulders. She looked like a rollerblading waitress this time with a stellar, atompunk cap around her temples and a microphone headset. Like before, Cupid had a small heart tattoo in vibrant red underneath her left eye and her lips were equally as rose. She wore a comical skirt, higher than her knees in length and bracelets that were more like vambraces from Roman times. The irony was not lost on Commander Shepard as she scoffed a little with a chuckle when she saw them.

Cupid scooched closer to them and leaned over their table, the view from behind would have been flattering, Liara thought and then realised the woman was a little worse and more provocative than the Asari dancers of Azure. “By the Goddess,” she whispered to herself as Cupid leaned, all action in her stellar hips.

“We have stunning destinations for a quick night getaway. Or we have some venues inside that could definitely accommodate you, two lovely ladies,” Cupid explained, looking through a list on a brochure pad she had with her. Then she leaned up, looking at both Shepard and Liara, handing together. “Oh, we are so grateful that we have you two here for your three year anniversary,” she cooed at them.

Shepard had to correct her. “Actually, it might count as a one-year anniversary. Since I was clinically dead for two of those years,” she reminded Cupid, Liara, and herself. Those two years lost had left a gaping hole still in Shepard’s heart and mind, and she clambered to have them back, but she knew she never would. The Collectors, and by extension, the Reapers had taken her life from her already, and it was only down to Cerberus and Miranda that she had it back. How fucked up is that? Shepard thought momentarily as the events occurred to her.

Cupid tisked. “Love is love is love, Commander. And I have reassurance the pair of you were in complete love even for the two years and twelve days you were on that operating table, honey. But I digress, venues for an anniversary for Commander Shepard and The Shadow Broker,” the short and pastel-coloured myth continued.

Liara paused her, looking quizzically at her. “Shadow Broker?” She asked, feeling intensely perverse and shocked. Not many knew that Liara was the information broker and owner of a small army. How did this woman?

Of course, Cupid gawked at her with a glance. “Really?” She asked, knowing they both had the answer already but it was their choice if they believed it or not. “Believe me or not ladies, but I seriously am Cupid, and I have had to reiterate too many people’s sexual and romantic history today to go through it again,” she jabbed at them both, making Shepard’s eyes pop. “I’m Cupid, once again, and please, let me do my job and find you two the ultimate plan of romance for this anniversary, okay dolls? Okay?” She asked, again and again, looking between both of them. Shepard and Liara were still relatively dumbfounded to respond. “Okay, let me start again.

“We have an Ice Rink floors above, as big as you can imagine with features and attractions inside of it for a fabulous time skating,” Cupid began to read out, looking through the brochure pad and swiping her finger across between possibilities for the ladies. “Or, as I said, we have possibilities for romantic getaways to uncharted but safe and habitable planets for the night. We have lodges on several of them or if you’d prefer to go natural and camp we can arrange that as well. There are…” Cupid paused, looking rapidly down the list, slide to slide. “We have an array of fantastic bars dotted around the hotel, or indeed the galaxy. I know there’s one at our venue on Illium that’s had a lot of amazing reviews lately. Or we have casinos for the perfect night of gambling and fine wine,” she referred to them, looking at the swath of feedback available to her. Then Cupid looked back up to the Human and the Asari. I just got off the phone with this lovely couple from an alternate dimension that told me they had a fantastic date at our in-house casino there and they’re thinking of taking things to the next level, it was soooo sweet, gals, seriously.” It looked as if Cupid was even about to blubber and cry. “It makes me fall in love when people fall in love, really.”

Shepard looked to Liara and vice versa, both deciding on what they would want to even do for their first official anniversary together. Although it couldn’t happen at a worse time, with the galaxy at war all around them and the crew of the Normandy even grounded to shore leave for the meanwhile, they had to admit they were incredibly lucky, more so than anyone they knew.

“I think what we’re both looking for is something a little private but entertaining and special,” Shepard asked of Cupid, choosing to go with the fact that she was as mad as a hatter and possibly a god. The Commander smiled and looking back to Liara. “Right? That’s what we want tonight, right?”

Liara blushed a little under her gorgeous blue hide. “Yes,” she reaffirmed, looking to Cupid herself, and reaching to hold Shepard’s hand across the table. “We’ve been in the combat simulator for the morning and I think we need something relaxing, secluded and special for the rest of the day. Do you have anything that fits our parameters?” She asked of the pink-haired woman.

Cupid was welling already, overwhelmed by the obvious and enormous amount of love radiating from the pair of powerful women. “No matter what dimension, and what couple, you two will always be one of my favourites. You’re perfect for each other, lemme tell you that ladies. And I have the perfect place for you,” she told them, flitting through slides and pictures of the precise place she had in mind for them. It took a couple of seconds, during which Liara and Shepard leaned in and passionately smooched each other, and Cupid squirmed when she saw it. The love was threatening to make the matchmaker glow like a rainbow. “Here we go!”

It was an arid place, semi-desert-like and with gorgeous scenery. Rocky formations around and still patches of verdant greenery. When Cupid flicked through slides, the images showed enigmatic and never-before-seen wildlife running around like oxen or antelopes. And on top of a high formation of rocks, there stood a stunning lodge that looked bigger than most high-end apartments and houses on the Citadel or even Thessia. It looked amazing. Shepard’s eyes widened and Liara seemed to instantly beam at the picturesque setting.

“For one night and one night only my girls, this lodge is yours to stay in, completely furnished, stocked with food and wine, other drinks and anything else you might need, along with a complete package of surprises to sink your teeth into. Just make sure you’re outside with a fire on the extensive balcony when the sun goes down - the view is something you’ll never forget,” Cupid advertised, pulling a key from a chain around her belt for this very occasion. “What’d’ya say?” She asked them finally.

They both looked at each other and then back to the brochure pad, looking between more images of the place and the wildlife around it. “What planet is this?” Shepard asked.

“A little place called Eos, all the way in the Andromeda Galaxy, so don’t worry, you’ll have it all to yourself.”

In reality, the lodge seemed completely alien in every way to both women once they passed through the threshold of the elevator door at the Citadel branch of The Cupid Hotel and into the Eos Lodge an entire galaxy away. Liara and Shepard were silent, stupefied as they looked to the horizon and saw something from a dream - sand and heated plain as far as the eye could see, with wildlife running free and grazing on the sparse greenery of the local flora. Alien flora. Above, the sky somehow felt completely different to any sky either had seen in the Milky Way. And while they both knew that in the morning, or the afternoon, whenever they woke and had breakfast tomorrow, they would leave via the front door and be back on the Citadel. As Cupid had told them; “Tomorrow, when you’re rested and fed at breakfast, just ring the indoor bell and the door will reconfigure itself to bring you back, you’ll step from the lodge out into the Citadel street as if you were leaving this very hotel, it’s as simple as that.”

It certainly didn’t seem as simple as that. Shepard and Liara looked at each other, stunned at where they were and how they had been transported an unfathomable distance in less than a second when there were hundreds of thousands of people currently only a year or two into a six-hundred-year trek to get where they were now. Locked into each other’s gaze, Shepard began to beam.

“Well… What do you want to do first?” She asked her Asari lover.

Liara wasted absolutely no time at all. She practically leapt across the gap between them and held Shepard in her arms, cupping her cheek and pulling her into a deep and unadulterated kiss that threatened to shoot stars into Shepard’s vision. She melted into the exchange in no time, humming internally as her heart fluttered and the air inside of her sung in choirs like angels. Liara tasted somehow better than ever as they kissed so closely. She felt profound, her curves so explicit in the Commander’s arms and grasp. Liara had always had a sublime figure, yet here, in the middle of literally nowhere further than any lifeform they knew, Liara felt so much more amplified, yet not from the field of mass effect fields. She felt suddenly heavier, more physical. Her hips swayed in Shepard’s hands and they motioned around, twirling as if they were dancing. It seemed like the lodge detected a rhythmic movement because as they spiralled around the open-floored entry-room, music began to bounce and flood the surroundings as they kissed.

The passionate Asari began to giggle under her breath as she held Shepard close. The redhead didn’t care about the music, she was engrossed in Liara’s actuality. She wanted her now, and they were as alone as two life forms could be. There would be absolutely no one coming in and interrupting like Joker had done the first time they had tried to have a moment on the Normandy.

Shepard leaned her head down, nibbling into the cross of Liara’s neck, her usual blue and white ensemble was sparing, she had shed the neck brace that covered the back of her neck where the grooves of her scalp-crests came into her body. Shepard had always remarked that the cartilage that made up Liara’s ‘hair’ had always looked beautiful to her, yet her lips and her starry eyes had always been the parts that Shepard was most fond and envious of. Without the bracer around Liara’s neck, Shepard found it each to nibble on her body.

T’Soni could not help but gasp as Shepard bit into her passionately, moving her hands to stabilise both of them. The Commander moved her own hand to press gently into Liara’s navel, brushing her hand down it, as if to claw for fleshy contact.

“Eager, Commander?” Shepard heard Liara whispering sensually, the tingling and yet numbing feeling of a mass effect field beginning to spiral and form around them.

Shepard licked the curve of Liara’s neck once more and held her hips closely, kissing the neck and then her chin again. “Looks like too eager. What’s on the cards?” Shepard asked, her eyes smoky and glistening from the dull light flitting through the blinders of the wide windows. The sun was already setting on this far away planet of Eos and both women only just noticed it, turning to see the blinders.

Without words, the broke away, Shepard still holding Liara’s fingers in her hands as the Asari took her over to the window. “Come here, Shepard, come with me,” she asked, walking slowly to the window. Liara drew the blinds a little, giving them a canvas of the sublime sunset, the orange was so deep-seated and explosive, as if the sun was so much younger than Sol and Parnitha. They just stood there, watching the star as it became enveloped by the dazzling horizon. The sky was sparsely cloudy and what was there was burnt red by the angle and position of the sun. Liara could not but help contently as she shifted her weight into Shepard and rested her head on the Commander’s shoulder. “This is perfect, Shepard.”

Shepard wrapped her arm around Liara’s shoulders and cuddled her closely, kissing one of the many strands of semi-flexible cartilage around her head. Those crests were lovely. “It is… And so are you, Liara.”

The Asari looked to her lover, and Shepard’s emerald eyes stared back at her with the hungry smirk on Shepard’s lips. Standing on her tiptoes, Liara stood up to kiss Shepard once again, in the pure and stunning light of the Andromedan sunset.

Shepard had pulled a whole salmon from the icebox, and Cupid had been right - the freezer, cupboards and pantry of the kitchen were brimming with any number of food and meats. All ingredients required for any kind of dish present and Shepard had taken ages figuring out what to actually cook. Liara had simply told her to make whatever her heart desired, the Asari was willing to try anything that Shepard made for her. She was taking a shower as the Commander prepped the stove and filleted the fish. After much deliberation once Shep had found the divine looking fish and had two exquisite looking fillets out of the carcass, she had decided to tap into some of the limited culinary knowledge she had picked up on an outback space station in the Terminus Systems one year when her mother had been stationed around the Omega Cluster - Teriyaki Salmon with Sesame Pak Choi. Omegans and other societies outside of the pompous and uptight Traverse had fallen in love with oriental Earth cuisine, and while it did fine within the Attican Traverse, on the Citadel and mostly Human Space, nothing compared to the likes of it around Omega and the Terminus Systems. The range of dishes from Asia specifically had become delicacies on Ilium.

She had the salmon fillets salmon already prepared when she could hear the water running in the master bathroom. Liara had been amazed at the size of it and wanted a shower and a change of clothes. Shepard would be hitting it briskly just before dinner was ready. She heated the oven and mixed what ingredients she had left for the sauces and such, pouring them over the salmon and shutting the fish inside to bake. The rest of the dish was simple, and took less than ten minutes to prepare, after five of which, Liara was coming out of the shower, running a fresh white towel over her head to shake the droplets as she entered the kitchen in a suave and alluring yellow dress.

Benezia’s favourite colour had been yellow, Shepard knew that face better than most of the geography of the homeworld. It had been instilled in her the day she and Liara had had to let her pass. Shepard had been the one to make sure Liara didn’t let that crushing loss utterly break her after Noveria, all during their chase for Saren. Again, so much had happened since the pair had met on Therum that the years had all blurred into one singular stretch of time. Even the six months in the stockade on Earth had felt like a week of sleep and hot food to Shepard, yet she’d been tearing her hair out for the entire time without Normandy and any contact with her Shadow Broker. When she saw Liara wearing the yellow dress, no sleeves, not even any shoulders, just a rockabilly inspired shawl of gorgeous yellow that made her look simply angelic. Blue under yellow suited Liara better than any other colours.

“You look absolutely beautiful,” Shepard told her love, a little moonstruck and with a famous blush creeping over her cheeks. It was not easy to make the Commander blush. Her cheeks almost reflected the deep red of her hair.

Liara performed a small and simple twirl to show off the movement of the dress and her exposed legs. She was barefoot and Shepard realised she did not see the Asari’s feet very often. But they were beautiful too, not they ever could not be. “I know we didn’t say we were dressing formally, but this was a birthday present from Miranda Lawson, and I decided there would be no better time to wear it.”

Shepard couldn’t help but grin like the messy queer she was. “I’m glad you did. You seriously look gorgeous,” she said again, struggling to find new words or any words.

The Commander finished everything with the food and cooled down the oven to give herself more time. “The pak choi is ready, can you keep an eye on the fish while I quickly take a shower?” She asked of Liara and the Asari hummed in affirmation with a stunning smile. As Shepard hovered past her they caught arms and kissed swiftly before Shepard hit the shower.

Less than five minutes, a brisk hair wash and swift change into her suit pants, tuxedo shirt buttoned up all but the top three and no bra at all, Shepard was back, running her hands through still wet and messy red hair, letting it dry itself, as she usually did. She planted yet another kiss on Liara’s cheek as she passed her lover. “Should we eat on the balcony?” She asked the Asari, but Liara couldn’t respond.

Shepard stifled the oven’s flame and let the salmon breathe a moment longer in the heat, soaking into the sauces and juices of the chilli. “Liara?” She asked, then turned to see the woman blushing profusely. “Honey?”

Liara still couldn’t speak, she was totally dumbfounded with how amazing Shepard looked in the shirt and pants, the collar blatantly opened and her back somewhat exposed through the whiteness of the shirt. It was in this that Liara was once again greeted with how hysterically toned and perfectly sculpted her lover’s body was, even with the dotted cybernetic implants that were scattered around her body, holding her together and keeping her living in some places. Liara was struggling to contain her pining for the woman. Shepard took out the salmon and began to plate up happily.

“What is it?” She finally asked, turning around and then seeing the blush under the blue. “Oh, shit,” she cursed, buttoning up another button just to be safe. “You were wearing formal wear too, honey,” she reminded the Asari, knowing that the tux and her body was rendering Liara speechless. Shepard carried the plates as she walked outward and toward the balcony. Liara eventually followed, grabbing a bottle of wine and two glasses for them too, as well as a little something for later.

“That was exquisite, Shepard,” Liara complimented, finishing the last pieces of salmon and covering it in the splendid sauce. Shepard let out a subtle belch and set her plate under the loveseat they were sat on the outside. The balcony itself was extensive and near the other end was an advanced and semi-portable telescope with which to observe the stars. Once Liara had finished her dish she stowed underneath the seat on top of Shepard’s and let out a small yawn, reaching for the bottle of wine and pouring herself another glass.

They cuddled up, letting the cold wrap around them and make them feel closer. There was a pile of blankets behind the loveseat anyway if they got too chilly, they had options. But just the feeling of Shepard’s veiled body close made Liara slip into a sleepy state of warm euphoria. They had never really had time like this together before, so far away, so disconnected to everything else in their galaxy. Cupid transporting them further than any Human or Asari had ever been had forced them to become disconnected, and making it for a single night had made it so finite that it was impossible to not enjoy and fall in love with the time they had alone in this unattainable lodge. This did not exist, not really. They had simply set food into a dream for a single night, for a meal out of the world and for time alone, so alone that it seemed like everything else not in the realms of their vision did not exist at all. And in some sense, it really didn’t.

It was just them, Shepard and T’Soni until they finished breakfast the next morning.

“You know, when Udina and Anderson told me that Benezia had a daughter somewhere in the Artemis Tau cluster, I had no absolutely no clue what to expect,” Shepard confessed, beginning to drift away with her thoughts and speak aloud with Liara held close to her. A blue hand came to her chest and held her closely.

The smile was heard in Liara’s next lines. “What did you expect, Commander?” She asked peacefully, her eyes open and looking up also.

“I… I didn’t know what to expect. Someone like Benezia I guess. A plant or a trap, something else to ruin the way things were going like everything else was back in those days,” Shepard continued, her eyebrows reacting. “I definitely didn’t expect to find the person I’d want to share the rest of my life with.”

She felt a kiss on her collarbone and then Liara’s weight shifting, as she crawled onto her knees and began to straddle Shepard. Her deep eyes were like oceans with feelings, history and a will that transcended the cosmos. Inside Liara’s eyes, Shepard could feel the might of eternity, or time and consciousness itself, just like she’d experienced those times Liara had connected them on a mental and spiritual level when reading the Prothean vision, and then during those two times aboard Normandy.

“Are you happy you found me on Therum?”

“You already know that I am.”

Liara’s eyes began to blacken, as her hands came to Shepard’s shirt buttons, her fingers effortlessly unsealing them slowly, even tracing her collarbone a little as a rush of feeling flooded over their bodies so much so that it actually felt like they were being swallowed by ecstatic waters. Mass effect fields shuddered and rocked them as Shepard felt a familiar sensation rocking her body to the core. She had felt this before, twice before, and the experience was no less exclusive and explicit this time around as it was the first.

“Prove it, Shepard,” she heard Liara singing to her as the blackness of her eyes wholly encompassed them as past through the space between them, dragging Shepard into the maelstrom of eternity with her lover. In a bright and dark flash, Shepard seemed to see and feel all of time and space all around her.

When she opened her eyes, the only thing she could think about could see and could feel, was Liara T’Soni. The Asari was all of the eternity around her, their bodies so close as Liara draped her like liquid, undressing her until they lay on the loveseat completely naked. Of course, it felt like everything. Liara’s body covered her, their embrace so close and succulent, the feeling and taste of honey entering Shepard’s mouth, Liara’s kiss wetting her lips and making her own shell sing with lust. They both felt legs crossing and caressing their own in light and velvet movements, moment stretching until the ends of forever as they cradled the other. Shepard felt herself breathing heavily in no time as Liara’s hands draped her chest, cupping her breasts, then lips coming to them too. Moans escaped the desperate Commander as the nightfall doused them in cool luna light. Up above the moon looked like one giant spotlight, an eye to bear witness to their small fraction of the cosmos. The more Liara began to feel Shepard’s physical form, the blackness of their eyes deepening as they slipped all the more into a realm of connective pleasure, feeling the other swimming in the neurons of their mind, the more the Commander gasped and began to moan. Liara held her closely, lips forming seals around the exposed mounds of her breasts, and a blue hand dipping further down Shepard’s body. The Asari held her lover like a trophy like she was the only physical thing in the universe and the fiery feeling between them in their heads. Shepard was lost in clouds of euphoria, feeling like she was falling with just Liara to carry her. It was exquisite, so unlike the previous two times, they had done this but absolutely, unbelievably incredible. It was so raw and emotive, just them, and all of the creation feeling like the air around them.

Liara’s fingers entered between Shepard’s legs and the redheaded Commander cried out in heated pleasure, her legs turning to jelly and her arms coming around Liara’s neck, pulling up her as she went to work down below. They kissed again, wetly, tongues exploring the other’s mouth with a perpetual need for more lusty connection. The mind melding grew stronger, and Liara’s lips curled with ecstasy as she stroked into her lover, rubbing her inner walls and filling her up with delight.

“Embrace with me, Shepard. Embrace eternity with me again…” Liara breathed, flicking her thumb across the pearl of Shepard’s sex, then removing her fingers and shuffling more, slotting her own exposed silk to her lover’s as their lips collided once again. Shepard was weak, steadily and minutely crippled by the weight of forever swirling around them but she too shuffled to sit up, pulling Liara back down to kiss her by her neck a little forcibly.

Both women opened their eyes to reveal the blackness of the pupils, overcome by the connection they shared. “I love you, Liara,” Shepard almost cursed, her eyes threatening to cry. Liara held her cheeks and embraced her in a deep and passionate kiss.

“You are my everything, Shepard. I will always love you, no matter what happens,” Liara replied, beginning to shift her weight back and forth with her hips, grinding gently into and along Shepard’s sex, making the Commander struggle all the more.

With muscular arms, Shepard held herself steadily and reaching up for Liara’s lips once again, moving her own core back and forth, feeling a fire between both their legs as they connected physically, wetness seeping from each other and slathering them in it as they moved in time. Liara was overcome with the same moans as Shepard in the middle of their kiss from the pyre sparking in her sex. Her body hummed and grooved with Shepard, her legs numb and flowing like running from a tap. The space all around them felt like a forest fire as they shuffled together, grinding on the other like a vibrant carpet of pleasure, a pole of spitting heat. Liara was gasping for water, Shepard too, as the heat caught them and set them both aflame. It was burning euphoria, like pleasurable paper while they connected and saw into each other’s soul. Fears, hopes, desires, all surpassed them and surrounded the other like screens, displaying the deepest excesses of the Commander and the Shadow Broker. But overwhelming everything else was their love and their lust for each other. Splitting the horizon and creating a white light that stopped time was their undying love.

Shepard’s sex, wet and grinding more and more against Liara’s azure screamed with satisfaction to the highest degree. A rhythmic pulse emanated from her slit and her pearl softly hummed to her like singing a melody. Liara and her movements, the way her body shifted and reacted upon the pressure and slightest movement that Shepard put upon her, they were the melody to which the Commander’s body was singing.

Each finger was a probe and as Shepard felt herself hitching, her body heaving and jerking as she neared climax, she reached for Liara’s fair face, to touch and to feel.

“I will always love you,” Shepard breathed and together, they broke, each feeling an oncoming wave as they pressed into their mutual climax. They relaxed and slithered back into each other’s arms when finished, their energy spent and the cold wrapping around them. Eternity faded and forever washed away until they landed back in the stream of time and space. The moon was high in the sky and the night in full effect, morning on the horizon.

Liara pulled one of the blankets over them both and they soundly fell asleep in each other’s arms, their anniversary complete.


End file.
